Batman: The Long Halloween – The Last Halloween to feature more unseen Tim Sale art than expected. George Pérez is the first comic book artist included in the National Portrait Gallery. Local Comic Shop Day to skip this year. All on Comic Book Club News for June 11, 2024.
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Episode Transcript:
The Last Halloween to feature unseen Tim Sale art.
George Pérez featured in National Portrait Gallery.
Local Comic Shop Day to skip a year.
This is Comic Book Club News for June 11, 2024.
Batman: The Long Halloween – The Last Halloween To Feature Unseen Tim Sale Art:
We had previously reported here on the podcast that Batman: The Long Halloween – The Last Halloween, the final chapter of the story started by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale decades ago, would feature art by Sale on the first issue’s cover, a posthumous tribute to Sale, who passed away in 2022. However, thanks to a panel at Dallas Fan Expo attended by Loeb, we know the project will include more Sale art than expected.
In fact, unused art by Sale will be the main covers for at least the first six issues of the ten-issue series. Interiors will be provided by a rotating crew of artists including Eduardo Risso, Klaus Janson, Mark Chiarello, Cliff Chiang, Bill Sienkiewicz, Enrico Marini, and more. Chiang, Sienkiewicz and Marini will also provided variant covers for issues of the series.
Despite being sold as the conclusion of a trilogy, this is the fifth collection in Leob and Sale’s series, which picks up after Batman: Year One, and continues the story of the fall of the gangs and the rise of the freaks in Gotham, all centered around a killer called Holiday whose identity seems to change with every story. The new series will premiere this September.
George Pérez Featured In National Portrait Gallery:
Speaking of beloved DC Comics icons receiving posthumous tributes, George Pérez is the first comic book artist ever to be featured in the National Portrait Gallery.
The news was reported by The Beat, who notes that the movement to include Pérez in the Smithsonian began in 2022, the same year he as well passed away. 2022: really bad year, I gotta say!
Anyway, the Comics Art Museum and DC Comics reached out to the National Gallery in the other D.C. to see about including portraits taken by DC’s Director of Design, Steve Cook, during a trip Pérez took to the Warner Bros. Studio Museum four months before the artist passed away. They’re lovely pictures, full of joy as Pérez poses in front of the Nolan Batman costume, art and costumes from the Wonder Woman movies, and more.
While the three photos are currently not on view at the Gallery, they are part of the collection and can be viewed online at npg.si.edu.
Local Comic Shop Day To Skip 2024, Come Back In 2025:
Like any good comic book creation, Local Comic Shop Day is dying this year — but it will come back bigger and better in 2025. I guess I could have just said it was taking a year off.
Anyway, the event is sort of a corollary for Free Comic Book Day. While that event happens nationwide, and in May; Local Comic Shop Day focuses only on ComicsPro-affiliated stores, and usually happens later in the year. Per ICv2, the retailer organization is skipping this year to realign when it happens — specifically, the 2025 and 2026 events are now scheduled for the last weekend in September, instead of later in November.
Said ComicsPRO Executive Director Marco Davanzo: “September is usually a slow month. By moving it to the Fall, we hope more publishers, retailers, and distributors can participate as it won’t overlap with an already busy end of year/winter holiday season; and [it will] stake out its own unique space on the calendar.”
As part of the event, the current plans are to have a two-week sale starting in August, as well as free comics, graphic novels, and paraphernalia to give out at stores, to bring folks in to support their local comic book shop.
So, no event this year, but fingers crossed they will indeed be back in 2025.
For Comic Book Club News, I’m Alex Zalben. And this year, I’m celebrating three-hour-long drive to the closest comic book store day.
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